Saddam Goes South (Park, That Is)

Matt Stone is a brave man. Not so much for co-creating “South Park,” the controversial animated TV series, which has just morphed into a Paramount movie--with his college buddy Trey Parker. Stone is brave because he’s standing in the shrimp line at his own premiere at the Hollywood club Arena, foregoing the VIP tables to be a man of the people.

Under the circumstances, we thought we’d grab Stone and ask him about his casting coup. Saddam Hussein is one of the animated characters in the film, “South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut,” and, according to the credits, the voice was provided by the Butcher of Babylon--if you believe everything you read, that is.

OK, what’s the story on Hussein in their movie?

“It’s like anything else in L.A.,” Stone says blithely. “It’s who you know, and we had a couple of good friends, big producers, who knew people in Iraq. Saddam was psyched, you know. He’s trying to soften up his image a bit.”

Hey, beneath its crude exterior, “South Park” is just like anything else in L.A. It’s part of the star-making machinery. Parkies trekked en masse to Mann’s Chinese Theatre for Wednesday’s premiere, among them Christina Ricci, Bernie Taupin, John Singleton, Bijou Phillips, Amy Heckerling and Stone and Parker’s Comedy Central colleagues Jimmy Kimmel, Adam Carolla and Ben Stein.

Since Stein is an actual grown-up, we were curious about his membership in the cult of “South Park,” which largely consists of college kids. It turns out that Stein is one slightly creaky college kid.

“I’m a huge, huge, huge, huge fan of the TV show, ‘South Park.’ I let my son watch it. He’s 11. I even encourage him to watch it. It is so smart, clever and insightful that I think it offsets the profanity, and it doesn’t seem to encourage him to use profanity. It does seem to make him a better social observer.”

Not that Stein is taking his kid to see the much more profane movie version any time soon.

“But I think he’ll see it,” he said. “He’ll hire a homeless person to take him.”

Hmmm. We don’t want to give away any plot points from the film, but it must be true that entertainment gives kids ideas. Anyway, we did find one person at the party who was offended by the outrageous film.

“But I still liked it,” said Verne Troyer, who’s enjoying his first 15 minutes of fame as Mike Myers’ tiny double in the strenuously silly “Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me.” “I liked it, but I don’t think it’s right for some of the younger generation. I don’t think the people who see ‘Austin Powers’ should be allowed to see this.”

Summer film competition. It’s murder.

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The late Harold Robbins wasn’t a big fan of rules, so he probably would have enjoyed his book party Tuesday, which broke one or two. The pop of potboilers couldn’t make the party for the paperback edition of “The Predators” (Forge). So his old friends, Larry Flynt and Buddy Hackett, and his widow, Jann, signed books at the Hustler Hollywood Erotic Boutique.

“When he wrote this book he was in excruciating pain,” Jann said. “He had surgery right after he finished it, four hip replacements, and he was in pain 24 hours a day. But he wouldn’t take strong pain killers because he wouldn’t be able to write. He would go to his typewriter, and writing gave him a release from that pain.”

Book parties typically celebrate hardcover printings, but Robbins would have been delighted by a party for the paperback, his widow said. Jann passed on a party for the hardcover edition in May 1998, because it was only a few months after Robbins’ death at 81.

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Irene Lacher’s Out & About column runs Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays on Page 2. She can be reached by e-mail at socalliving@latimes.com